Mission accomplished, be it with a scar.

I arrived in Lisbon on my birthday, sailing in good weather conditions. Here I will be waiting for Viviane to join me. And although it was quite an experience to do some 700nM solo on a new boat, I am very happy that we can continue together.

Viveiro was a nice place, not that I saw a lot of it.  I was mainly focused on every weather window that could get me out of the Bay of Biscay. And even though it was not my initial plan to stop at A Coruña, I left the next day for an easy 60nM day trip to this well known marina.

I took just enough time to fill up my diesel tank, to stroll a bit around the historic center, and to enjoy a good meal. Because the next morning, long before sunrise, I was on my way again for another nice day trip to Muxia.

Muxia is a small marina, just north of the Cape Finisterre. Lots of wrecks in that area, the weather can be heavy here at the border of the Bay of Biscay. That might explain why so few cruisers have a stopover here. But I loved the place, and the marina was not expensive at all.

My next stop was to be Porto or even further south, as far away as possible from the fast approaching low. But that morning, the weather forecast was a lot less favorable than the days before. But waiting till this low would pass over, meant waiting at least 4 to 5 days with no garantee that what followed would be much better. To get as far south as possible, I knew it was at least a 30-hours trip, so I intended to leave very early that morning. But when I woke up at 2am, the wind was howling in the marina. Not exactly what was predicted. The next hours, I considered every option, studying new gribfiles and weather charts over and over again. Finally at 5am, I decided to leave, knowing that it wouldn’t be possible anymore to arrive in day light in Porto. And with two possible escape ports as plan B in mind.

What followed was a perfect nice day of sailing, although with a lot of swell. But as the evening fell and as I was crossing the border of Portugal, the wind turned and picked up to 30kn and above. There I knew, I was caught up by the low, and the already big Atlantic waves started to build quickly. At 8pm I got a message from Viviane that, according to Windy, in front of Porto it was hell, and around me it was all thunder storms. So I decided to navigate to my nearest escape port: Póvoa de Varzim.

At almost 3am, I arrived at the breakwater with waves over 5m high crashing on to it and with 35kn of lee shore wind making it pretty hard to keep O2 under control. No way to get my boat ready for docking in these conditions without taking risks, so I decided to wait till I was in the safety of the harbor.

My entrance was a spectacular and stressful surf in between the breakwaters. Once in the harbor, no buoy appeared to be lit, leaving me to guess which ones were indicating the small access path to the berths, and which ones were indicating danger zones. All of this with 35kn of wind pushing me to the dark shore and the impossibility of leaving the rudder for more than a few second. I only managed to put out 1 fender and 1 line (in normal conditions that would be 8 fenders and at least 3 lines), as I was blown to the pontoon. And that’s when I ran out of luck:
Almost no place to maneuver, I had no choice but to dock without all the protection I so badly needed. The berths were too small for a catamaran, and the nearest head of the pontoon turned out to be already battered, lacking most of the wooden board that normally protects boats, leaving only an aluminum profile with some screws sticking out of it. Without mercy the screws drilled a deep scar into my brand new O2 the moment she was pushed violently against the pontoon.  (The photo couldn’t quite catch it, but at one point, it was almost a cm deep !)
It hurts, I can tell you, it really hurts… but I immediately realized that all of this could have been so much worse. 
Less than twenty minutes later, with all the fenders and lines in place, and the boat still wildly rocking & shaking, I fell on my bed completely exhausted and slept till morning. It was only when I woke up that I fully realized what situation I had been in a few hours earlier. 
Apparently, the harbor had been closed due to the sea state. But none of my pilot books had mentioned the signs and even in daylight they were difficult to spot. One book advised to take a wide turn around the breakwater because “the surf could be important”. Well, tell me all about it.

That Sunday the harbor stayed closed all day, with heavy breaking waves at the entrance. Monday morning I contacted the local wharf to repair at least the worst damage. At around 3pm I left Póvoa de Varzim in perfect calm sailing conditions for another 22hour trip to Peniche, my last overnight trip before Lisboa !

I was so happy to finally enjoy some smooth sailing, without engines and no stress at all. I had almost forgotten that this is also possible. So when I arrived the next afternoon in Peniche, I felt like completely reborn again, and I stopped worrying about that first scar.

The fifth of December, another nice sailing day brought me in 14 hours to Parque das Nações, Lisboa, where we will stay till the end of this year.

Since I left La Rochelle three weeks ago, we have done 930nM together. From now on, we are a mature team, my O2 and I.